Republic of Mining

NEWS RELEASE: Northern First Nations Leadership clarify involvement in Infrastructure Development following Province’s Ring of Fire Announcement.

August 23, 2017

Thunder Bay, ON, August 22nd, 2017 – Leaders from Webequie and Nibinamik First Nations are clarifying their position for community members and neighbouring communities today following the recent announcement by the Province of Ontario with Premier Kathleen Wynn.

The two participating First Nations have signed a Joint Community Access Infrastructure Planning Agreement to collaborate on a specific study that could potentially bring a multi-purpose corridor to its communities and the Northern Ontario region. A multi-purpose corridor could connect the two communities to existing regional infrastructure and potential future developments.

The feasibility study of a multi-purpose corridor by the two First Nations will narrow the proposed ten-kilometer wide conceptual routes to a two-kilometer wide route and will determine any environmental constraints and future environmental considerations.

BHP’s US$14B Saskatchewan mine delay comes amid dark outlook for potash producers – by Jesse Snyder (Financial Post -August 23, 2017)

August 23, 2017

http://business.financialpost.com/

BHP Billiton Ltd.’s decision to delay a major potash mine in Saskatchewan comes amid a persistent weakening of demand for fertilizer, leading producers to shelve major investments and ink sizeable mergers with competitors to boost revenues.

On Tuesday, Melbourne-based BHP announced it would delay its multi-billion dollar Jansen potash mine, located about 150 kilometres east of Saskatoon. Analysts estimate the project could cost as much as US$14 billion to complete.

The decision comes amid a shaky outlook for Canadian potash producers, who have been forced to scale back major mining developments in the face of low commodity prices. It will also delay BHP’s entrance into the potash sector, as the company faces intense pressure from activist hedge fund Elliott Management Corp. to shed some of its underperforming assets.

Sudbury to get first crack at Ring of Fire nickel (CBC News Sudbury – August 22, 2017)

August 23, 2017

http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/sudbury/

Bruce Jago, director of Goodman School of Mines, weighs in on Noront’s decision to start

Four northern Ontario cities — Sudbury, Timmins, Sault Ste. Marie and Thunder Bay — are in the running to be home to a ferrochrome smelter which will process chromite from the Ring of Fire mineral deposit. But Noront Resources Ltd. CEO Alan Coutts says the first minerals out of the ground will be nickel concentrate, to be processed in Sudbury.

Now that the provincial government has committed to funding the road infrastructure to the Ring of Fire, Coutts told CBC’s Morning North that his company plans to develop a mine at its Eagle’s Nest project first. The site — 530 kilometres northeast of Thunder Bay — is rich in high-grade nickel, copper, platinum and palladium.

“The reason we selected that to be the first mine is because there is already existing smelting capacities for those minerals in Sudbury,” Coutts said.

Morning North Host Jason Turnbull Interviews Noront CEO Alan Coutes about Ring of Fire Roads (CBC News Sudbury – August 22, 2017)

August 23, 2017

For the interview: http://www.cbc.ca/player/play/1029782083805/ Premier Kathleen Wynne was in Thunder Bay to announce the funding of a road for the Ring of Fire project. We spoke with Al Coutts from Noront Resources about what it means for developing the chromite deposit. Al is the CEO of Noront Resources.

OUR GAME: Former NHL factory Kirkland Lake proud of growing minor system – by Roy MacGregor (Globe and Mail – October 20, 2012)

August 23, 2017

https://www.theglobeandmail.com/

KIRKLAND LAKE, ONT. — It is a scene that could grace the back of the five-dollar bill. Youngsters are playing hockey outdoors, the sounds so familiar – skates scraping over ice, sticks striking pucks, a barking dog – that they even include the winter call of the Canadian mother, once so common now so rare.

“Steeeeeeee-vennnn! Dinnnnnner-timmme!” But it is not real.

It is, instead, a diorama represented what once was, the roots of a game so important to this small Northern Ontario community that Kirkland Lake even has its own impressive Hall of Fame – Hockey Heritage North – that celebrates what Foster Hewitt once called “The town that made the NHL famous.”

It is registration week in Kirkland Lake, Ont., that time of year when the town’s youngsters sign up for a sport that once defined Kirkland Lake every bit as much as the gold the various mines pulled from the quartz and faults of this dense northern bush.

OPINION: Switch to Renewables Won’t End the Geopolitics of Energy – by Meghan L. O’Sullivan (Bloomberg News – August 21, 2017)

August 22, 2017

https://www.bloomberg.com/

Countries that dominate the export of rare-earth minerals will be the petrostates of tomorrow.

In another sign that the age of fossil fuels is waning, the California State Senate has passed a bill to commit the state to use 100 percent renewable energy for power by 2045. Other states and cities — including Massachusetts, Chicago and Atlanta — intend to make similar switches. Proponents highlight a bevy of ways in which the Age of Renewables will improve our lives: lower carbon emissions, cheaper electricity rates, new abilities to bring power to impoverished nations … and independence from the economic and political entanglements of volatile global oil and gas markets.

Yes, there are many reasons to be enthusiastic about a shift toward renewables. Unfortunately, an escape from energy geopolitics is not likely to be among them.

Americans and Europeans in particular are familiar with the geopolitical downsides of a heavy reliance on fossil fuels. Even though energy embargoes are extremely rare, and hardly ever in the interest of the producers, the specter of the 1973 Arab oil remains. For many in Eastern Europe, the 2006 and 2009 gas cut-offs to Ukraine by Russia are an equally disturbing memory. Simply the threat of such actions carries political weight.

Superior Morning Host Lisa Laco Interviews Noront CEO Alan Coutes on Ring of Fire Roads (CBC News Thunder Bay – August 22, 2017)

August 22, 2017August 22, 2017

For the interview: http://www.cbc.ca/player/play/1029794883530/ Ring of Fire – NorOnt Reaction It’s been a long road for mining companies hoping to develop the Ring of Fire — but yesterday the province announced it’s building a road to the region. Alan Coutts is president of Noront Resources.

It’s Hard to Keep Up With All That Lithium Demand – by Laura Millan Lombrana and Jonathan Gilbert (Bloomberg News – August 22, 2017)

August 22, 2017August 22, 2017

https://www.bloomberg.com/

Hidden within the salt flats high in the Andes mountains of South America are vast deposits of the lithium that Elon Musk may need for his electric-car revolution. But extracting the mineral from brine ponds created by Orocobre Ltd. has proved more difficult than expected.

Bad weather and pump glitches meant production at the Olaroz facility in northern Argentina was 21 percent below Orocobre’s initial target in the year through June. While things are getting back on track, Chief Executive Officer Richard Seville says the company “either underestimated the complexity or overestimated our capability.”

Producers everywhere have struggled to keep up with demand as electric cars went from almost no sales a decade ago to more than half a million vehicles last year. The battery in a Model S from Musk’s Tesla Inc. uses about 45 kilograms (100 pounds) of lithium carbonate. More mines are planned, but difficulties at Olaroz — the first new South American lithium mine in two decades — are limiting funding for new ventures in Argentina, home to the world’s third-largest reserves.

North Kivu safer than Johannesburg says DRC tin miner Alphamin – by Brendan Ryan (MiningMx.com – August 22, 2017)

August 22, 2017

http://www.miningmx.com/

Canadian-listed Alphamin Resources hoped to finalise the remaining funding required to build the Bisie tin mine in the North Kivu province of the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) by the end of the year according to CEO Boris Kamstra.

Total cost of the project is estimated at some US$152m towards which Alphamin had already raised some $22m in July through private share placements. The company plans to raise a further $55m in equity along with $80m in debt.

Speaking at a presentation to financial media in Johannesburg on Tuesday Kamstra said that, all going to plan, initial production of tin-in-concentrate is expected during the first quarter of 2019 with the underground mine forecast to reach steady state production by the end of 2019.

Anglo American makes expensive bet on hydrogen fuel cell cars – by Barbara Lewis (Business Day – August 18, 2017)

August 22, 2017

https://www.businesslive.co.za/

London — Anglo American is placing a contrarian bet on hydrogen fuel cell vehicles as it tries to squeeze more profit from its platinum reserves, but risks being left behind as rival miners look to cash in on battery-powered cars.

A push, particularly in Europe and China, for lower-emission transport, raises the prospect of weaker demand for platinum, whose biggest industrial use is in diesel vehicles. Other big miners are positioning themselves for the shift away from the combustion engine by betting on lithium and cobalt, both used in electric vehicle batteries.

Glencore signed a major deal last October to sell 20,000 tons of cobalt products, a hitherto niche material whose production it dominates, while Rio Tinto is sitting on a large deposit of lithium. As the world’s top supplier of platinum, Anglo American is left with little choice but to remain committed to the metal.

The victor, the spoils? Trump eyes Afghanistan’s elusive mineral riches – by James Mackenzie (Reuters U.S. – August 20, 2017)

August 22, 2017

https://www.reuters.com/

KABUL (Reuters) – U.S. President Donald Trump is eyeing Afghanistan’s mineral wealth to help pay for a 16-year war and reconstruction efforts that have already cost $117 billion. Investors who have studied the country, one of the world’s most dangerous, say that is a pipe dream.

Ever since a United States Geological Survey study a decade ago identified deposits later estimated to have a potential value of as much as $1 trillion, both Afghan and foreign officials have trumpeted the reserves as a likely key to economic independence for Afghanistan.

As well as deposits of gold, silver and platinum, Afghanistan has significant quantities of iron ore, uranium, zinc, tantalum, bauxite, coal, natural gas and significant copper – a particular draw given the dearth of rich new copper mines globally.

Fannie Quigley, the Alaska Gold Rush’s All-in-One Miner, Hunter, Brewer, and Cook – by Tessa Hulls (Atlas Obscura – August 21, 2017)

August 22, 2017

http://www.atlasobscura.com/

She used mine shafts as a beer fridge and shot bears to get lard for pie crusts.

TALES OF ALASKA’S GOLD RUSHES, which began in the 1890s, are full of larger-than-life men—bold, cantankerous fellows who drank and swore and shot as they chased promises of gold across the stark, untrammeled tundra. But nestled among all the stories of men is the story of Fannie Quigley, a five-foot-tall frontierswoman who spent almost 40 years homesteading and prospecting in Kantishna, a remote Alaskan mining region that would later become part of Denali National Park.

Like the men around her, Quigley drank, swore, and shot bears—but unlike those men, she used her bear lard to create the legendarily flaky crusts of the rhubarb pies she served to her backcountry guests.

Over her decades in the backcountry, Quigley acquired a reputation as not only a renowned hostess and cook, but one of the finest hunters the region had ever seen. Her guests—who were many, despite the fact that her cabin was only accessible by foot or dogsled—

“This is the day we were waiting for”: Ring of Fire road agreement jumpstarts Noront Resources’ development plans – by Ian Ross (Northern Ontario Business – August 22, 2017)

August 22, 2017

https://www.northernontariobusiness.com/

An agreement in principle to bring permanent access roads to three remote First Nation communities near the Ring of Fire was greeted with relief from the largest mine developer in the region. “This is the day we were waiting for,” said Noront president-CEO Alan Coutts.

He was in Thunder Bay to hear Premier Kathleen Wynne’s Aug. 21 announcement that agreements have been struck with Marten Falls, Nibinamik and Webequie First Nations to build two corridors to connect those communities to the provincial highway system.

One proposed east-west corridor will be shared with the mining industry to reach the rich mineral deposits in the James Bay lowlands. Wynne said the initial preparatory environmental assessment work starts immediately followed by feasibility planning.

Fedeli slams Wynne over Ring of Fire – by Jennifer Hamilton-McCharles (North Bay Nugget – August 22, 2017)

August 22, 2017

http://www.thesudburystar.com/

Premier Kathleen Wynne’s announcement that the province will move ahead with building roads into the Ring of Fire is earning jeers from Nipissing MPP Vic Fedeli. Fedeli expressed frustration over the lack of concern for the North and empty promises over the last 10 years following Wynne’s announcement Monday.

“It’s simply election talk. She’s had 10 years to do something and now a few months before an election she’s making an announcement.” He said Wynne made a similar promise in 2014, but nothing was ever done.

“There’s actually been three funding announcements in support of the Ring of Fire and yet again, nothing has been done,” Fedeli said. “The latest was in the 2017 budget where there was no mention of the Ring of Fire, so where’s this funding coming from?”

Column: Resource-driven treaties often botched – by Tom Villemaire (Sudbury Star – August 22, 2017)

August 22, 2017

http://www.thesudburystar.com/

A copper strike in northeastern Ontario is one such example

In the late 1840s, the near north Ontario experienced a copper mining boom, but it didn’t come without problems.

The use of copper was exploding, thanks to the nascent industries of hydro-electric power and telegraphy, both of which drove demand for copper through the roof. This all came together in the 1830s — in 1831, Michael Faraday created an electric generator and in 1832 Pavel Schilling came up with the earliest working version of an electrical telegraph.

All this was taking place in Europe, but the technology — and the demand for copper — would soon affect the world, including the remote areas of what would become the province of Ontario.